A semiconductor device such as typically a MOSFET (metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistor) implementing a memory cell of a d-RAM (dynamic random-access memory) device is often fabricated using a process known as salicide or self-aligned silicide process. In this salicide process, a self-aligned silicide layer of a refractory metal such as titanium is formed selectively on the polysilicon gate and the doped source/drain regions of a semiconductor substrate. Semiconductor devices having such salicide configuration are expected to provide faster speeds and higher integration densities. There are however some problems inherent in semiconductor devices of this nature. As will be discussed in more detail, these problems largely result from the configuration of the semiconductor device in which the self-aligned silicide regions are contacted directly by conductor layers forming contacts and interconnects for the device. The present invention contemplates provision of an improved salicide-configuration semiconductor device free from all these problems inherent in prior-art semiconductor devices fabricated by a known salicide process.